p-Xylene is an extremely important chemical building block and is used in a variety of applications, but particularly as a starting material for the ubiquitous polymer polyethylene terephthalate or “polyester” (Köpnick, H., et al., 2000. Polyesters. Ullmann's Encyclopedia of Industrial Chemistry. Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, 2002). Accordingly, there is a need to develop new or less expensive ways to prepare xylene (e.g., p-xylene) or methods to prepare p-xylene from alternative starting materials.